George Mason in the News

Posted: March 23, 2007 at 1:00 am, Last Updated: November 30, -0001 at 12:00 am

Following are highlights of national news coverage George Mason recently received.

Monday, March 19, Arizona Republic

Aging Archives, Tech Pose Threat to Posterity

“Today’s technology has proved to be a double-edged sword: There’s no dispute that it has improved our lives, but it also has caused us to lose history as fast as we make it.Correspondence is by e-mail; hit delete and it’s wiped out. Thousands of photographs are taken; few are printed. Official records are increasingly digital. ‘There’s just a lot being missed,’ says Dan Cohen, assistant professor of history at George Mason University and co-author of ‘Digital History: A Guide to Gathering, Preserving, and Presenting the Past on the Web.’ ‘We live in an instantaneous age, a throwaway age.’”

Wednesday, March 21, New York Times

The White House and Congress Seem Headed toward a Familiar Collision

“The Bush administration has few equals in its commitment to a broad conception of executive authority, and it has on several occasions argued for an expansive understanding of executive privilege and similar protections. But legal scholars said that President Bill Clinton asserted the doctrine of executive privilege more often and more vigorously, including in the investigation of his relationship with Monica Lewinsky. ‘Clinton clearly was more aggressive in using executive privilege than any of the modern presidents since Eisenhower,’ said Mark Rozell, a [public policy] professor at George Mason University and the author of ‘Executive Privilege: Presidential Power, Secrecy, and Accountability.’ ‘Bush has been somewhat reluctant to use it.’”

Wednesday, March 21, Time

A Coming Battle over Bush’s Executive Privilege

“Executive Privilege looms as the nuclear option in George W. Bush’s battle with Congress over its investigation into the firing of eight U.S. attorneys. ‘Executive privilege is not actually mentioned in the Constitution and has been called ‘a constitutional myth’ by legal historian Raoul Berger. President Eisenhower was the first to use the phrase and was its firmest proponent, according to Mark Rozell, a professor at George Mason University and the author of two books on executive privilege. ‘Eisenhower took a very strong stand, especially during the McCarthy hearings,’ he explains. When Senator Joseph McCarthy demanded that White House officials testify in 1954 about suspected communists, ‘Eisenhower responded that any man who testifies to Congress about what advice he gave me will not be working for me by nightfall.’ But running in the administration’s favor is the uncertain context of Congress’ demand for testimony. When Nixon and Clinton invoked the privilege, they had to argue against the strong interests of special prosecutors in obtaining information for a criminal investigation. ‘Here, we’re talking about a congressional committee asking for testimony,’ says Rozell. ‘It’s a lot murkier.’”